Strong on paper, short on podiums: Indian athletics’ Nagoya reality check

Vithya Ramraj broke P.T. Usha’s long-standing national record to take bronze in the women’s 400m hurdles (54.75s). She then anchored India to gold in the women’s 4x400m relay (3:29.69), reclaiming the title ahead of Bahrain. Coupled with her mixed 4x400m relay silver, Vithya completed a full set of medals at the Games. | Photo Credit: R.V. Moorthy

The athletics medals kept coming in Aichi-Nagoya, but the gold remained elusive. For six days, India collected silver and bronze at Mizuho Park Stadium before the women’s 4x400m relay team finally broke the wait on September 29, the final day of competition, winning the nation’s only athletics gold in Nagoya.

However, the overall medal tally remained strong. India returned with 24 medals, its third-highest athletics haul at the Asian Games. Athletics was also once again India’s biggest medal contributor, accounting for 28.2 per cent of its 85 medals, compared with 27.1 per cent at Hangzhou, where India won 107 medals, and 28.6 per cent at Jakarta-Palembang in 2018, where it collected 70. The increase in athletics’ share, therefore, owed as much to the fall in India’s overall medal tally as to its own performance.

Historic finishes

Vithya Ramraj was one of India’s outstanding performers. Her bronze-winning 54.75 seconds in the women’s 400m hurdles set a new national record, taking 0.67 seconds off the mark P.T. Usha had set at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics and Vithya herself had equalled at Hangzhou.

The following evening, she anchored Kiran Pahal, M.R. Poovamma and Prachi Choudhary to the women’s 4x400m relay title in 3:29.69, holding off Bahrain’s Salwa Eid Naser. Along with silver in the mixed 4x400m relay, it gave Vithya a medal of each colour. India reclaimed the women’s relay crown after finishing second at Hangzhou.

Another national record, 2:11:37 in the men’s marathon, brought Sawan Barwal silver and ended India’s 44-year wait for a medal in the event. Competing in only his second marathon, he improved the 2:11:58 he had run in Rotterdam in April. India had not reached the Asian Games men’s marathon podium since H.K. Seetharam’s bronze in New Delhi in 1982.

Parul Chaudhary’s national record of 9:08.67 in the women’s 3000m steeplechase offered another reason to look beyond medal colour. She took bronze behind Bahrain’s Winfred Yavi and Kazakhstan’s Norah Jeruto, having won silver at Hangzhou. She also collected bronze in the women’s 5000m, the event in which her late surge had brought gold three years earlier.

Seema Kumari ended a 16-year drought for India in the women’s 10,000m with a historic bronze, India’s first medal in the event since its double podium finish in 2010, when Preeja Sreedharan and Kavita Raut took gold and silver, respectively. Elsewhere, Manpreet Kaur claimed bronze in the women’s shot put while Prachi Choudhary won bronze in the women’s 400m.

Dev Kumar Meena raised the men’s pole vault national record to 5.50m but finished seventh. His result highlighted the distance that can remain between a domestic breakthrough and a continental medal.

Gulveer Singh became the first Indian to win medals in three middle- and long-distance events at one Asian Games. Silvers in the men’s 10,000m and 1500m, followed by bronze in the 5000m, rewarded a demanding schedule of four races, including the 1500m heat, across five days.

Murali Sreeshankar won silver in the men’s long jump, his second consecutive medal at the Games after his silver in Hangzhou. Meanwhile, Tejaswin Shankar bagged a bronze in the decathlon to become the first Indian man to win two medals in the gruelling discipline at the continental showpiece.

India’s first Asian Games medal in women’s pole vault came through Baranica Elangovan. She cleared 4.15m to share bronze with Kazakhstan’s Polina Ivanova. Her clearance was below her national record of 4.23m.

A first women’s high jump medal in 24 years followed through Pooja Singh’s bronze. Her clearance of 1.84m was below the national record of 1.93m she had set earlier in the year, but ended a wait stretching back to Bobby Aloysius’s silver in 2002.

Expectation vs execution

The gap between performances earlier in the season and those in Nagoya was particularly apparent in the men’s sprints. Gurindervir Singh, who had lowered the men’s 100m national record to 10.09 seconds in May, ran 10.32 in his semifinal and failed to reach the final. Animesh Kujur, the men’s 200m national record-holder at 20.32, finished fifth in that final in 20.80. He also exited the 100m in the semifinals.

A national record of 41.06 in the mixed 4x100m relay brought Gurindervir and Animesh bronze alongside S.S. Sneha and Harita Bhadra. It gave them a podium finish, although their individual events remained a disappointment. Harita also won women’s 200m bronze in 23.20.

National records set before the Games had raised expectations in the jumps, too. Sarvesh Kushare, who had cleared 2.31m earlier in the season, won men’s high jump silver at 2.25m, losing to Chinese Taipei’s Chao Hsuan-Fu on countback. Ancy Sojan, whose national record stood at 6.88m, took silver in the women’s long jump with 6.53m. China’s Huang Yingying passed her by two centimetres in the final round. Both Indians were close to gold, but also short of the standards they had established.

The comparison with Hangzhou was not uniformly one of declining performances. Toor’s 20.64m for men’s shot-put silver was farther than his title-winning 20.36m in 2023. Iran’s Mohammadreza Tayebise, however, won with a Games record of 20.81m. Sable’s title defence in the men’s 3000m steeplechase ended in fourth place, his season-best 8:21.67 insufficient for a medal.

With Neeraj Chopra absent, Yashvir Singh produced a personal best of 85.72m for men’s javelin silver, while Rohit Yadav took bronze. India retained two places on that podium, but the gold-and-silver finish from Hangzhou became silver and bronze. The men’s 4x400m relay team also moved from gold to bronze.

Nagoya left Indian athletics with specific questions about reproducing its best performances when medals were decided. It also supplied evidence of progress through national records, new medal events and athletes capable of competing across distances. The women’s relay ensured the anthem was heard before the programme ended. The task now is to make that moment less exceptional.